SIGNIFICANCE OF DERIVED PRE-QUATERNARY FORAMINIFERA IN HOLOCENE SEDIMENTS OF THE NORTH-CENTRAL BRISTOL CHANNEL

Flandrian and modern sediments of Swansea Bay and its approaches, north-central Bristol Channel, yielded benthonic and planktonic forminifera derived from Late Cretaceous, Eocene, Oligocene and Miocene source rocks. It is concluded that they were reworked from outcrops in the area of the modern Celtic Sea during Late Devensian and Early Flandrian time. The palaeogeography of those times is reconstructed and the palaeooceanography is discussed; Early Holocene sediment transport directions and mechanisms are postulated and their changes during the Holocene, to the time of the development of the present-day sediment distribution, are suggested. © 1979.